The Sentencing Council is analyzing whether or not being pregnant ought to be a stronger motive to not ship a feminine offender to jail.
It launched a session final month which is able to study the potential affect of being pregnant and giving start as a prisoner, and it is on account of publish its resolution in November.
Current steerage solely means that judges “may consider” being pregnant when sentencing.
Campaigners say there is no such thing as a statutory responsibility to think about it, and judges usually do not – and that unborn infants are put in danger in jail and should not be punished for his or her mom’s crimes.
Others argue being pregnant should not be used as an excuse to dodge punishment.
Sky News has spoken to a few girls who’ve skilled being pregnant in jail and describe a daunting, isolating and humiliating expertise.
One we’ll name ‘Olivia’ mentioned being despatched to jail pregnant was “traumatic beyond words, terrifying, lonely and deeply unsettling”.
She mentioned: “There aren’t the midwives, there’s not the 24/7 support. If someone has a medical emergency, how many sets of keys does it take to unlock all the doors to get through? And that’s before you can even get into the prison to get the paramedics or the midwife to the woman.”
‘Laying in a mattress of blood’
Another, ‘Susie’, mentioned she had nobody to show to when she thought she had miscarried her child in her cell.
She mentioned: “They didn’t realise that I was still laying in a bed of blood,” and added she had “a horrifying wait” all weekend to get her state of affairs checked with a scan.
Susie says jail life is unsuitable for a pregnant lady: “I received rather a lot hungrier, they usually advised me that they would not present me with extra meals, and I did not have a being pregnant mattress.
“I feel like as you gain more weight, your body’s pressing into the bed and you spend an awful lot of time in your room.”
A handcuffed start
A 3rd girls ‘Anna’, who additionally needs to stay nameless, describes her expertise as “humiliating” and says she gave start whereas handcuffed to a jail officer.
She says the officer “told me to be grateful that she was putting me on long cuffs and not short cuffs”. These are cuffs with an extended chain.
Anna says that solely when she had a second being pregnant exterior of jail, did she realise how substandard the care is for girls behind bars.
She mentioned whereas in jail “I had appointments that had been missed. I had a scan that was coming up. I ended up missing that a couple of times because they never had the staff to take me.
“Eventually I went and was taken by the entrance of the hospital in handcuffs. That’s very degrading and humiliating.”
She added: “When I went into labour it was early hours within the morning at 5.30am. I pressed my cell bell. An officer advised me that anyone can be with me quickly. But no person got here.
“I pressed it another three, four times. Nobody came. They only then unlocked me at the same time they unlocked the rest of the landing.”
Anna added: “I didn’t see the nurse till about 9.30 in the morning. I wasn’t sitting in an ambulance to go to the hospital until around 10.30am. I had been told that the ambulance was there, but it was waiting outside of the gates because it had to be security cleared to come into the prison.”
Ministry of Justice figures present that three births occurred in jail or on transit to hospital in 2021-22.
The case of Aisha Cleary
In July this 12 months, an inquest discovered “serious operational and systemic failings” contributed to the possibilities of survival of child Aisha Cleary, born to an inmate in HMP Bronzefield in Surrey.
Her 18-year-old mom, Rianna Cleary, gave start alone in her cell on the night time of 26 September 2019. She known as for assist, however no person got here. Aisha was discovered lifeless within the cell the next morning.
An ombudsman report into Aisha’s dying printed in September 2022, not solely criticised the care of Rianna, however made a wider conclusion that “all pregnancies in prison should be treated as high risk by virtue of the fact that the woman is locked behind a door for a significant amount of time”.
Campaigners say it due to this fact follows that any jail sentence to a pregnant lady can also be a sentence to a high-risk being pregnant – and a menace to their child. But the ladies we spoke to say their being pregnant wasn’t considered throughout their sentencing.
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Speaking at a vigil which was held exterior the Ministry of Justice to recollect the anniversary of the start and dying of Aisha, Janey Starling, from marketing campaign group Level Up, mentioned: “It is so evident that prison will never be a safe place to be pregnant.
“Pregnant girls in jail are seven occasions extra prone to undergo a nonetheless start, twice as seemingly to present start to a untimely youngster that wants particular intensive care and in the end the long-lasting trauma on a mom and a baby is devastating.”
These arguments are supported by the Royal College of Midwives and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and can inform the Sentencing Council’s resolution on whether or not being pregnant ought to be a higher mitigating consider deciding whether or not somebody goes to jail – set in opposition to the necessity to punish individuals who commit crimes.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson mentioned: “Custody is always the last resort for women and independent judges already consider mitigating factors, like pregnancy, when making sentencing decisions.
“We have made important enhancements to the help out there for pregnant girls in custody in recent times. This contains using specialist mom and child liaison officers in each girls’s jail, conducting extra welfare checks and stepping up screening and social providers help in order that pregnant prisoners get the care they want.”
The session is presently open for submissions, and they’re on account of publish their findings on 30 November this 12 months.
Any new steerage for judges would come into practise subsequent April.
Source: information.sky.com”